“Sid Caesar is a mysterious and com­plex man who seems to have been sin­gled out by the gods to set two all-time records, one of dubious and unenviable distinction: to have set the high-water-mark for sustained comic brilliance over a long period of years, and to have in­gested enough booze and pills to kill the Lippizaner stallions.”

Katie Colombus: “I so wanted to say that times had changed. … I thought back to those days, when at least one in four of the girls in my institute were either anorexic or bulimic, and the rest had fairly serious aspirations of joining either side. … But I don’t think we have moved forward.”

“An East Village bohemian when the neighborhood contained more discarded syringes than million-dollar condos, Ms. Estep became a regular at the Nuyorican Poets Cafe, one of the incubators of the slam poetry movement.”

“Every single step that they [the board and the school administration] have taken is counterproductive to music education,” he says. “It was like an abusive relationship. You only take so much for so long and then you ask, “Why am I killin’ myself here?”

George Packer: “Perhaps a sector that monetizes information is more likely to become obsessed with protecting it than if the product were oil or cars. But even in this atmosphere, Amazon is reflexively, absurdly secretive … From Amazon’s point of view, there might be nothing to be gained from greater openness … But I would argue that a culture of secrecy is bound to end up harming the institution itself.”

“Penguin India has agreed to recall and destroy all remaining copies of a book on Hinduism by a leading American academic … Wendy Doniger’s book The Hindus: An Alternative History had been the subject of a legal challenge claiming the text was offensive to Hindus.

“Recently hired general director Rob Tannenbaum has resigned as head of the Sacramento Region Performing Arts Alliance – the merged organization formed out of the Sacramento Philharmonic and Opera … for ‘personal and professional reasons’.”

“Jamie Hendry Productions, which is producing the show, set out to raise £650,000 using an online platform the company created specially for the project, with investment available at £1,000, £2,500 or £5,000.”

“The term ‘restorative experiences’ was coined by University of Michigan psychologist Stephen Kaplan. He wanted to understand why walks in the park, or even looking at a picture of a landscape, can recharge your mental batteries.”

“If you maintained this reading speed, you could read War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy in 11 hours and 1 minute,” I am told. Well, I think if I maintained that speed, my brain would combust, and I was cheating a bit…

“The Hatchet Job – as all self-styled rebellions and expressions of naughtiness do – relies on the idea of a flourishing literary culture, peopled with literary colossi wielding influence with every metaphor they scrutinise, pontificating weekly in seemingly endless literary sections, dominating the stage on television arts shows, venerated across the land. Oh. Right.”

“We launched the site thinking it would be a good way to find books through your friends. We didn’t fully anticipate the strength of the communities that cropped up, where people were friending not just people they knew in real life but people they had been meeting on the site.”

“Most writers manage to get by because, as the deadline creeps closer, their fear of turning in nothing eventually surpasses their fear of turning in something terrible. But I’ve watched a surprising number of young journalists wreck, or nearly wreck, their careers by simply failing to hand in articles.”

“Germany will set up an independent center to comb museum collections for art looted by the Nazis, the country’s culture minister said, shortly before representatives for the son of an art dealer tied to Hitler disclosed another hidden cache of paintings.”

“Two grandes dames of [British] classical ballet” – Gillian Lynne and Beryl Grey – “have ridiculed repeated claims that today’s dancers are driven to exhaustion and starvation and say pushing them to the limit is the nature of the art.”

Judith Mackrell: “There’s no doubting the heroic stamina and toughness of generations like theirs but it is important to point out that ballet has itself got tougher. In the 21st century, dancers – like athletes and sportspeople – are pushed to higher levels of achievement, speed and strength. They also dance a much more varied repertory than Lynne and Grey ever did.”

“I’m a populist, basically. I think a lot of culture is boring, and I like people to have a good time at my shows. There’s a sort of Roundhead bullshit around culture: the more serious and difficult it is, the more it hurts you and your audience, the more worthwhile it is. It’s a form of bullying.” (Note to Americans: “Roundhead” = “Puritan”)

“What makes a champion? Why do some wilt in high-pressure competition, while others rise to the occasion? Drawing on science, psychology, sports and economics, authors Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman explore the anatomy of building champions.” (podcast)

“What did Paris smell like in the mid-18th century? Try skunked red wine, wet cats, and gingivitis-tinged sputum, all bubbling in an open sewer on a record-setting summer’s day.” Sniff for yourself, at an exhibit now in San Francisco.

David Lan: “What we’re really not doing is transplanting the Young Vic to downtown Manhattan, but we are starting from the same position we started 14-15 years ago. Let’s think about who is there, let’s think about the work we want to make, let’s think who we want to talk to.”

“Chu has led the Kansas City’s Kauffman Center since 2006. She was an executive at the Kauffman Fund for Kansas City from 2004 to 2006, and VP of external relations for Union Station Kansas City from 2002 to 2004. She also has degrees in visual arts, piano performance and music education.”

Rob Clearfield, Wherever You’re Starting From (Woolgathering Records) The Chicago pianist’s low-key approach to solo piano might lead to wool-gathering that would justify the name of his label. But he bolsters the ... read more

One dating app I’ve used is called SilverDaddies, and my straight friends usually belch a laugh when they hear the name. “What’s funny?” I ask, and they never have an answer. Silver threads ... read more

NEW YORK – High Noon is a great movie, but does it immediately jump to mind as a story that’s ripe for re-evaluation and revision? The 1952 original was a superior western thanks to its strong ... read more

My staff of thousands informs me that the Smithsonian Institute has posted scans of three notebooks by William S. Burroughs and Brion Gysin dating from 1963 to 1973, and 1977. It was described to me ... read more

It’s common modern practice to consider art and commerce in opposition to each other, and artists and accountants as cartoonish polar opposites, as well. But it wasn’t always so. About 520 years ago, art and ... read more

Fredric March appears as the mystery guest on an episode of What’s My Line? originally telecast live by CBS on March 21, 1954. John Daly is the host and the panelists are Margaret Truman, Steve ... read more

“His imagination projected itself lovingly across the footlights, gilded and coloured the shabby canvas and battered accessories, and lost itself so effectually in the fictive world that the end of the piece, however long, or ... read more

This is the last of a series, introduced in Baby Steps, about arts organizations’ initial efforts in community engagement. For details about the premises upon which these posts are based, see below. The essence is ... read more

In pithy new blurbs, the National Portrait Gallery’s revamped and reinterpreted “America’s Presidents” installation strives to tell each former officeholder’s “unique stories of both triumph and failure” (in the words of the introductory wall text). ... read more

Charles Plymell writes: I sent Robert some old political cartoons on crumbling paper from 20’s-30’s & some extra sheets of the plain parchment which had beautiful tan sheen like I ran the first ZAP on. ... read more

From 2008: I never saw Paul Scofield on stage. Few Americans did: he performed in this country only once, in the 1961 Broadway production of Robert Bolt’s A Man for All Seasons. So his death ... read more

“It occurs to me that writers don’t change much from the time they are thirty or thereabouts until they are laid away—permanently, I trust. As they grow older, they are apt to perform at somewhat ... read more

We had the Attacca String Quartet in residence here this past week. Started things off with a 2-hour seminar on composer-performer collaborations, featuring performances of three Caroline Shaw quartets: Entr’acte, Valencia and Blueprint. That evening, ... read more

Yesterday I spent eight long but gratifying hours at Houston’s Alley Theatre, rehearsing for the Texas premiere of Satchmo at the Waldorf. Then I drove straight from the theater to the home of Lauren and ... read more

Yesterday I spent eight long but gratifying hours at Houston’s Alley Theatre, rehearsing for the Texas premiere of Satchmo at the Waldorf. Then I drove straight from the theater to the home of Lauren and ... read more

“I would have practiced the piano and realized that playing the piano is not something you just do to the best of your abilities. Playing the piano is something where you have to pursue your ... read more